The College Dropout

Taking nothing away from Messi. His excellence is unrivalled. Every week you can see it. But Cronaldo is the difference. The reason his teams have gone to the semis of the CL something like 7 years straight is him. If Bayern have him last season they win the CL. He deserves all his ballon d’ors because he goes out and does the business. Has done for a decade. Applaud him.

It was Fonte coming into the side then. Carvalho legs had long gone.

Messi was injured and wasn't in the squad in 06 Looking it up again. He was injured 2 months prior against Chelsea. They won that tournament without him. I think half that Side were involved in 2009. Portugal go out in the group stage with Eder upfront most likely. I do agree that Pepe was the MVP but Ronaldo came up in big moments.

Aye they wouldn’t have made it out of the group. They got three points in the group stage with him ffs They drew 3-3 to get the last point. He scored twice and assisted. Nobody else would’ve picked up the slack. They go out. Pepe came into the team in KO’s returning from injury and they kept it tight afterwards iirc.

The first CL Messi won he was on the bench in the final in 2006 I believe. Henrik Larsson came off the bench to win it iirc. He was a bairn obviously. The second in 2009 they were by far and away the best team in Europe and they win it without him imo. He was the diamond of that team but the only close game I recall was the Chelsea one where Iniesta came through in the clutch. The final was absolutely one sided.

Scored twice and assisted the other to get Portugal out the group. Scored and assisted in the semis.

Portugal won the Euros without him and I would argue that him getting injured helped them in that particular game as all of their players could focus on defending. I think Real would have won the CL without Ronaldo last season personally. Which two CL's could Barca have won without Messi? Real Madrid get eliminated by Bayern Munich without Ronaldo. Did he not score 4 goals over both legs and got a Bayern player sent off? He (and refereeing decisions) were the difference.

Aye they wouldn’t have made it out of the group.

Ronaldo is THE DIFFERENCE. In the Euros and the CL last season. Real couldn’t have won it without him. On at least 2 occasions I’m both tournaments he was the difference. At least 2 of Messi’s CL’s Barca could’ve won it with him on the bench. 1 of them they did. But yes obviously Messi is the better and more talented, gifted player. But last season clearly Ronaldo deserved it.

I remember Mole scoffing at the idea of signing Evans because we had that freak Yanga-Mbiwa in our ranks Who is miles better.

When Atsu returns I would try Murphy at AM. Or Ritchie AM. Or Atsu AM.

N’zonzi

Aye huge blow that. Was playing very well.

Aye he’s had some good final balls. Either nobody was there or Joselu.

Henderson’s slightly above average. Liverpool will never challenge consistently for the league with him so integral. And Gini Wijnaldum whose application makes him nowt special. Henderson lacks ability. Gini lacks character.

Seems a lot of work to expand by 8k but good that it’s staying in Selhurst rather than CP.

Fully agreed. The standard of punditry has improved and more effort is made but the attitude of some is infuriating. Especially Phil Neville, if you know so much go manage a Championship team. Watching the debate on sky has made me dislike Merson less, he's just a bloke with some opinions. Some of the other goons they have on that show think that they're intellectuals, offering incredible insight that no one else can see or understand(Bellamy, Rosenior, Phil Neville, Murphy).

Agreed it’s very hard for centrbacks to jump into this league. Think the Chelsea lot have done well to hit the ground running.

Thing with Merse. He doesn’t take himself too seriously. I don’t like the pronounciation stuff but otherwise he’s ok. It’s the likes of Phil Neville who really annoy me.

Burnley’s second choice keeper is better than our first. Wood has 4 league goals from 9 starts. Well drilled defence. I like most of their midfielders. Tarkowski and Mee are better than all of our defenders sans lascelles based on this season. Mee in particular is limited on the ball but he gets his head on the ball and gets his blocks in. Committed. A leader. The whole team is like that. We have always had soft players. We are like old Spurs in that regard. A soft touch.

It’s more than concentration. Seems to be slow and/or lack agility. Chelsea pinged 3 Long balls in behind him which caused panic. 1 was the offide one. Another was the Morata header where Lejeune jumped but couldn’t reach the header and another was the Hazard goal where he had to super stretch to stop the long ball reaching Morata. There was also the ducking out of the header for Moratas goal. ‘Good player’ thing. Usually means how comfortable players are on the ball an ability to play under pressure. First touch, moving with the ball and passing. Lejeune has the most quality from our CB’s on that aspect. But off the ball, actual defending he’s looking a liability. Players running at him. Balls in behind. Balls in the air. Le struggle.

Dummett seems to take awhile to get going after injury. He would make the back 5 much stronger mind in place of Ritchie. Would be interested in seeing Gayle, Murphy and Atsu in the same team too.

We have the highest percentage of headed goals before Chelsea. 30% something. Assuming most assisted by Ritchie

What a mightily weird post. Lingard did a dance move. You’ve gone on to talk about guns, limping, throwing money and gangsters. Because he did a dance move. This post is worse than the after / Lascelles post. If you see a black person do something that looks hip hop oriented, don’t embarass yourself like that again. Didnt mention anything about a black person in my post. No but you’ve seen a man dancing and then gone on to talk about several unrelated cliches of rap / gangster music. And a band totally unrelated to Lindgard or the dance who haven’t been relevant in Lingards life time. Don’t play dense. He’s danced and you’ve made several quantum leaps about god knows what. I can only assume you’ve seen him do the dance and attributed the dance and/or him to a Gangsta music caricature. Yep Lingard is a cock end. He was acting up with some gimp moves that this generation give their little cool names to like dabbing etc. The public enemy reference is to a group of political hiphop activists who were the real deal. No pretending to be ghetto like most of todays s**** these plebs listen to then act out as goal celebrations. Why the hell are you crying. It hardly matters. Pm me if you wanna carry on being a clever dick. Who is "pretending to be ghetto"? You're making some really weird connections. It's a dance. Again, with the weird connections. I'm pointing out your wierd post. Nobody's crying. No need to PM you at all.

Good chance. Not a sitter.